The west is trying to quietly forget Ukraine. It does so at its own peril.

Some tsars are real, some are fake. If Holy Russia expands its territory and other peoples bow before the autocrat in Moscow, the vassalled population that toils and struggles and heroically sheds its blood for the sacred fatherland thinks it is a blessing from God. And then it doesn’t matter very much how the tsar came to power or how he rules over his subjects. He can butcher them in their millions, destroy thousands of churches and execute the priests – all that matters is that the tsar is real, for then the enemy will tremble and the Holy Land will extend. That’s how it was with Stalin.

Conversely, military failures and the loss of even a small part of the Holy Land will be seen by the tsar’s subjects as a clear sign that the tsar is not blessed – that he is an illegitimate fake. Did he botch the war with Japan? Did he fail to subjugate the Chechens? If so, that man on the throne is a con artist posing as a tsar. That’s how it was with Nicholas II and Boris Yeltsin.

Putin legitimised his presidency by regaining Crimea, but his legitimacy is evaporating with his inability to win against Ukraine. The next tsar will, in turn, have to prove himself by achieving victories in the war against the world. And if, for this Putin, threatening to deploy tactical nuclear weapons is merely one aspect of hybrid warfare, for the next Putin deploying them may become a necessary tool in his effort to secure power.